It is a common misconception that people in the Late Medieval and Early Renaissance meals were hedonistic, violent, and with no sense of cleanliness or manners.

In truth, etiquette guidelines were complex and exacting. These rules, however, varied from country to country. In England, meals remained fairly bawdy even when the rest of Europe was seriously reigning in the ribaldry.

For example, an Italian guest at the royal table reported that Henry VIII would thrust “gobbits” of food into one cheek then the next. But In the rest of Europe, more refined manners had been adopted by the time Henry VIII reigned in England.

The authority on etiquette was mainly guided by Giovanni della Casa’s book, Galateo: Oero de ‘costume, (The Rules of Polite Behavior). It included how to dress well, develop witty conversation, and how to behave at table.

In his book, he admonished:

It is not polite, while at the table, to scratch your head or somewhere else. A man should also, as much as possible, avoid spitting, but if he must, he should do it discreetly.

When I cook, it seems I’m always looking up things like converting cups to grams or ounces, a simple brine for poultry, ratios for baking, bread dough conditioners, internal temps for baked goods, conversions for not-sugar sweeteners, or how to cook with gluten-free flours, etc.

If only I had that information in one file that I could print out and plaster to my refrigerator door or put in a sheet-protected notebook.. Hmmm. I’m so brilliant sometimes, I scare myself. Maybe others, too but not for the brilliant part.

Let’s start with… RATIOS

scale

Baking is science and alchemy all rolled into one. But, the amazing thing about baking is that there are simple formulas to help you bake without a recipe.

Recipes are relative. Weather, humidity, air temperature, measuring methods, oven temperature quirks, bakeware materials, how old your ingredients are, different techniques for mixing and combining ingredients, elevation, and more can all affect how your cake, brownies, bread, cookies, pie, and such will turn out.

The FAB four – Not the Beetles

Any baked good has a foundation. Almost all baked goods consist of varying amounts of:

Flour

Liquid

Eggs, Fat

For those of you who like Memes, think, FLEB.

There is often also salt, yeast, and sweetener

You also need to know how to combine the ingredients and the finer points of baking, such as kneading, cutting butter into flour for pie crust, oven temperature, rolling out dough, doneness temperature, and such. But if you know your ingredient ratio half or more of the battle for baking amazing goodies is done.